Slovakia@30 Lecture Series: 30 Years of Slovak Foreign Policy – Wednesday, January 18, 2023

 “Slovakia@30” Lecture Series:
30 Years of Slovak Foreign Policy
featuring Ambassador Radovan Javorčík
January 18, 2023
4:30 pm EST

Slovakia@30 is a collaborative project of the Slovak American Society of Washington, D.C. (SASW), Friends of Slovakia (FOS), and the Embassy of the Slovak Republic in Washington, D.C., to commemorate the 30^th anniversary of Slovak independence.  The project consists of four online lectures by distinguished experts on key areas of public life in the Slovak Republic: foreign policy, domestic politics, the economy, and civil society.  Although each lecture will be a self-contained presentation, the organizers have designed the four-part series to be an integrated overview of Slovakia’s development over the past 30 years.

At the time of the peaceful split of Czechoslovakia on January 1, 1993, Slovakia was little more than three years into its post-communist transition.  The young country faced immense challenges establishing an independent foreign policy, consolidating democratic institutions, and creating a market economy and a vibrant nongovernmental sector.

What can we say now, from the vantage point of 2023, about how well Slovakia has met these challenges?  What have been the country’s greatest successes?  Its greatest failures?  And how well prepared is contemporary Slovakia for the challenges of the present and the near future?

SASW, FOS, and the Slovak Embassy have recruited four exceptional speakers to address these questions for this Slovakia@30 lecture series.  They are:

January 18, 2023:  H.E. Radovan Javorčík, Ambassador of the Slovak Republic to the United States (“30 Years of Slovak Foreign Policy”)

February 23, 2023:  Kevin Deegan-Krause, Professor of Political Science, Wayne State University (“30 Years of Slovak Domestic Politics”)

March 16, 2023:  Ivan Mikloš, Chairman, Strategic Advisory Group for Supporting Ukrainian Reforms and former Deputy Prime Minister of the Slovak Republic (“30 Years of the Slovak Economy”)

April 13, 2023:  Zuzana Wienk, Director of Bystriny (Currents), a civil-society organization that helps civic initiatives and active citizens work together to improve their communities (“30 Years of Slovak Civil Society”) [date to be confirmed]

To register to participate online in the January 18 event, visit https://www.eventbrite.com/e/30-years-of-slovak-foreign-policy-tickets-488353216617.